SOF

Polar Fitness App Leaks Sensitive Information on US Military

The Finnish-based fitness tracking app Polar has disabled its global activity map feature after last week when it was learned that a simple click was all that was required to track down the real-world identities of military and intelligence personnel.

Polar Flow, one of Polar’s apps, was allowing anyone to access a feature called Explore, which is a basic activity map. The data that is readily available on this feature included a user’s past activity, such as running or biking routes, but also the user’s personal details such as heart rate, physical attributes, and more personal data.

While other fitness apps have released similar activities in the past, for example, showing popular running, hiking, or biking paths, the Polar app exposed the username and personal details of each user for each individual’s activity.

This is the second incident in a few months, in January experts discovered that military worldwide have publicly shared online their exercise routes recorded through the fitness tracker Strava revealing the fitness sessions conducted inside or near military bases.
During the weekend, Dutch security experts revealed they were able to find data on some 6,000 individuals including military personnel from dozens of countries and FBI and National Security Agency personnel.
According to an investigation by the news website Bellingcat and the Dutch news agency De Correspondent, the fitness devices were leaking data belonging to the military or intelligence officials who could be exploited by a threat actors to spy on them.
“With only a few clicks, a high-ranking officer of an airbase known to host nuclear weapons can be found jogging across the compound in the morning,” explained the security researcher Foeke Postma that investigated the case with the Dutch news outlet De Correspondent.
“We can find Western military personnel in Afghanistan through the Polar site. Cross-checking one name and profile picture with social media confirmed one soldier or officer’s identity.”

While only two percent of the Polar users chose to share their data, experts were quickly able to retrieve the names and addresses of military and intelligence personnel. Including the names and addresses of personnel at military bases including Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Arbil, Iraq, Gao, Mali, and bases in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Chad, and South Korea,

To read the entire article from Security Affairs, click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Why the US Lost the Drug War Vs the Taliban

Five years ago, with Afghanistan in danger of becoming a narco-terrorist state, several law enforcement veterans presented the previous Obama administration with a detailed plan to use the court system in the United States to prosecute Taliban commanders and Afghan drug lords who supply more than 90 percent of the world’s heroin supply. With a growing, now a national epidemic opioid crisis in the U.S. the plan made total sense.

As the administration knew then, the drug trade was hurting America in two ways. By fueling the opioid crisis and by financing the ongoing war in Afghanistan as that is where the Taliban is getting the vast majority of their funding. But to everyone’s surprise, the deputy chief of mission in Kabul for the Obama administration ordered the project shelved.

A senior Afghan security official, M. Ashraf Haidari, also expressed anger at the Obama administration when told about how the U.S. effort to indict Taliban narcotics kingpins was stopped dead in its tracks 16 months after it began.
“It brought us almost to the breaking point, put our elections into a time of crisis, and then our economy almost collapsed,” Haidari said of the drug money funding the Taliban. “If that [operation] had continued, we wouldn’t have had this massive increase in production and cultivation as we do now.”
The plan, code-named Operation Reciprocity, was modeled after a legal strategy that the Justice Department began using a decade earlier against the cocaine-funded leftist FARC guerrillas in Colombia, in concert with military and diplomatic efforts. The new operation’s goal was to haul 26 suspects from Afghanistan to the same New York courthouse where FARC leaders were prosecuted, turn them against each other and the broader insurgency, convict them on conspiracy charges and lock them away.
Its demise was not instantaneous. But the most significant blow, by far, came on May 27, 2013, when the then-deputy chief of mission, Ambassador Tina Kaidanow, summoned Marsac and two top embassy officials supporting the plan to her office, and issued an immediate stand-down order.
Kaidanow …as the administration’s “eyes” in Afghanistan — had concerns it would undermine the White House’s broader strategy in Afghanistan, including a drawdown that included the DEA as well as the military.

The administration wanted a drawdown at all costs despite the fact the Taliban were playing the peace talk game for all it was worth, knowing the U.S. was planning on scaling down their presence. Five years later, the Taliban are still playing this game and the drugs continue to flow from there and finance the Taliban.

The Justice Department people are ready and able to implement the operations once again. They just need a go-ahead from Washington.

To read the entire article from Politico, click here:

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 16, Day 3

Tuesday means Leg Day at the gym followed by sprints to build up speed and explosion. Begin with pull-ups and then squats, lunges and the sled followed by some sprint work.

Sprints will help with the times of your distance runs and your rucking.

Training:

Continue to prep for the UBRR

3 x Pullups 10 reps

3 x Towel pull-ups 10 reps

3 x Front Squat 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight)

3 x Body Weight Wall Squats with a stability ball, 20-15-12 reps

4 x Sled push heavier weight or Fire Man’s Carry

3 x 10 reps Dumbbell Lunges

3 x 20 Caterpillar Planks

40-yard sprint

50-yard sprint

60-yard sprint

80-yard sprint

100-yard sprint (after each sprint, walk back to the starting point and go again)

Stretch well after completion

Fauda: Israeli Series in The War on Terror Is Gritty, Brutal, Must-Watch TV

It isn’t often that I get surprised like this weekend when a very good friend of mine mentioned the Netflix series “Fauda” that is produced in Israel. He and his wife had been watching it and called me to recommend it. The exact words were, “if you like ‘Homeland’ then you’ll love Fauda”

The story centers around an Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), Special Operations/Intelligence team which is part of the Commando Brigade that works across the border into the Palestinian territory. The 24-part, two-season series begins with the protagonist Doron Kavillio who was part of the team but stepped away when family issues arose. He’s called back when Israeli intelligence learns that a senior terrorist, Taufiq Hammed, Doron believed he killed 18 months earlier, is alive and preparing to resurface for his brother’s wedding. Hammed, who goes by the codename “The Panther” is the most wanted man in Season 1.

Fauda which means chaos in Arabic was developed by Lior Raz and Avi Issacharoff who based the story off of many of their own experiences while serving in the IDF’s Duvdevan Unit. Doron and his team, are part of a Mista’arvim unit, who are specially trained units that are tasked with working undercover in the Arab areas with their ability to assimilate in the cities and towns. And their operations are seldom without events going awry as they frequently do and the very first operation at the wedding is a testament to that.

What makes Fauda so damned compelling is the outstanding character development on both sides of the border. While the story centers around “the unit” as they call themselves, they are hardly just the forces of good here. Each of the characters has his flaws, none as much as the hard-boiled Doron. If you’re looking for a suave, debonair James Bond-type character in a tuxedo and driving an Aston Martin, Fauda isn’t for you.

Doron is a shorter, heavy-set, balding, foul-tempered badass with a permanent five o’clock shadow. His marriage is falling apart, his wife is screwing another member of the unit after he ignored her for several years. In one moment Doron is seen cuddling and cooing with his children whom he adores, the next, he breaks the teeth out of a Palestinian suspect with over the top brutality.

When a member of the unit gets kidnapped by Hamas, Donor snatches the terrorist’s daughter and when they’re doing a prisoner exchange, straps one of the Palestinian suicide vests on the seven-year-old girl threatening to blow her to bits. No, this isn’t your father’s John Wayne hero here. But at the same time, whenever he’s onscreen, you can’t take your eyes off of Doron, he’s like a wolf in the backyard. He may not be exerting any overt hostility but you have to watch him because he’s apt to explode at any second.

Captain Gabi Ayub, the Israeli interrogator is another compelling character. The suave, slightly oily Gabi is a master manipulator. He knows exactly which buttons to push. In one scene, his eyes look positively doe-like while he talks to a Palestinian mother about saving her children. The next moment after another woman tells an Israeli female interrogator to “Shut up you Zionist bitch.” Gabi turns on the devil eyes. He storms into the room and tells the pregnant Palestinian that he’ll make her suffer a miscarriage in exactly one minute if she doesn’t tell him what he needs to know.

I’ve read that the show is a smash hit not only in Israel but in Palestine as well. The Hamas, ISIS and Palestinian Authority players get the same treatment, they are far from the one-dimensional characters that we’re used to seeing on screen. The very evenhandedness by the producers towards the Palestinians is one of the biggest draws of the show. The series shows both points of view in every scenario and takes great pains to show the plight of the Palestinians. While little is shown about the West Bank and the border other than the benign checkpoints, the contrast between the Israeli countryside and the rundown, seedy Palestinian territory is stark.

Nowhere is the plight of the Palestinians shown better than the tragic case of Dr. Shirin Al Abed. A half-French, half Palestinian woman of 32, whose husband died of MS. She spent most of her life in Paris, worked for Doctors Without Borders and only moved to Palestine to be closer to her mother.

Shirin is forced to work for Hamas after they kidnap her mother. He gets taken advantage of from both sides. Doron goes undercover and woos here while telling her he is a member of the Palestinian Preventive Security. Her life gets turned upside down as she’s caught up in the intrigue and bloody killing that she wanted no part of.

Although the story is told basically from the standpoint of the unit, the differences between the Israelis and the Palestinians gets mighty blurry. Both sides threaten, torture and kill with increasing reckless abandon. Both the unit and the terror cells have big issues with individuals losing discipline, ignoring orders and going off on killing sprees.

The one thing Doron, Hammed and in Season 2, al-Makdasi have in common is the personal enmities and blind hate the characters have for one another that trumps their duties and responsibilities.

The action, though bloody isn’t too graphic, it is, however, very gritty. Israel likes to tout its army as the “most moral military in the world” but Fauda lays waste to that claim and Doron and the unit, routinely snatch Palestinians off the street, torture and beat their captives in an attempt to gather information and kill the Palestinians with callous disregard.

The series shows the awful price of the type of war that the two sides are fighting both physically and mentally. And the price paid by the families in this series is very steep. And like all wars, there are very, very few black and white issues, but various shades of grey. Are there plot holes in the series? Yes. Were there believability issues as well? At times, sure. It is like that with virtually every film Hollywood has done.

But if you tune into to Season 1, clear your calendar. As I said I was surprised and in a good way. I binge watched all 24 episodes this weekend and can’t wait for Season 3. This is most recommended and despite it being broadcast in Hebrew and Arabic with English subtitles, it doesn’t take away from the story at all.

Photo Netflix

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 16, Day 2

Monday starts a new week, and we’ll continue with UBRR preparation. Start off with a mini-UBRR test of pushups, sit-ups, and crunches, then to the bar for V-ups, pull-ups, and dips before a 5-mile run. Remember to stay hydrated and mark your progress in your workout log book.

Training:

More preparation for the UBRR

2 x 20 Pushups

2 x 30 Sit-ups

2 x 30 Crunches

2 x 10, V-ups

2 x Dips as many as possible to muscle failure

2 x Pullups as many as possible or to muscle failure

5-mile run (40 minutes maximum)

Stretch well after completion

Green Berets and Afghan Commandos Take ISIS Stronghold

U.S. Green Berets and Afghan special operations troops captured a town that the Islamic State (ISIS) had claimed as their local capital. The large joint operation has been on-going for several weeks and culminated with the capture of Gurgoray on Saturday.

No Americans or Afghan troops were killed in the offensive, which the U.S. military said killed 167 fighters from the Islamic State group – also known as ISIS or Daesh – and involved a complex multipronged attack on Gurgoray, a town purported to be the group’s capital in Deh Bala district in Nangarhar province.
“This area, two months ago, was controlled by Daesh,” Brig. Gen. John W. Brennan Jr., commander of NATO forces in eastern Afghanistan, said at a special operations outpost in Deh Bala. “We pushed them into the mountains, so they cannot harm the people here.”
The U.S. and Afghan offensive involved five Special Forces teams and three Afghan commando companies. In total, 600 members of the U.S. Army Special Forces, also known as Green Berets, participated in the mission, which began in April and continued into June, a U.S. military officer said.
Checkpoints manned by U.S. Special Forces, Afghan commandos and police now rise high above the valleys of Deh Bala, while American fighter-bombers continue to blast the Gurgoray Valley to stifle movements there by ISIS remnants.
Nangarhar province is one of the few places Americans continue to fight alongside Afghan forces in battle, and it has also been the deadliest spot for U.S. servicemembers, with a third of American combat deaths occurring there last year.
The finger-like mountain ridges and wheat-filled valleys of Deh Bala district in Nangarhar have long provided shelter to insurgents – the Taliban, al-Qaida and now ISIS.
The district’s center lies 21 miles south of Jalalabad, the provincial capital where ISIS claimed recent deadly suicide attacks, and 11 miles west of Aachin, where the U.S. military in April 2017 dropped the largest bomb in its arsenal, “the mother of all bombs,” on an ISIS cave network.
Due to its location on the border with Pakistan, Deh Bala served as a key supply route for ISIS.
“ISIS was using this site as a site to prepare and stage high-profile attacks,” said Lt. Col. Joshua Thiel, commander of 3rd Battalion, 1st Special Forces Group.

After airlifting Afghan commandos and Special Forces teams to the ridges surrounding the valley, the coalition troops controlled the high ground and put the ISIS fighters under fire as they gradually closed the noose as they forced them out.

U.S. officials said they found evidence of ISIS fighters from 10 different countries in Gurgoray.

To read the entire article from Stars and Stripes, click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 16, Day 1

Sunday morning rucksack march. Do a quick warmup of pushups and sit-ups before heading out. Head out over varied terrain and try to go as fast as you can without running.

Stretch well both before and after the event. Remember to drink plenty of water and stay hydrated out there. Ensure to mark your times in your workout log book. Do you have more than one pair of boots broken in for the course? Bust out that second pair this week.

Training:

Warm up

1 x 20 Pushups

1 x 20 Sit-ups

10-mile Rucksack march over varied terrain with a 45-pound minimum. Go as fast as you can without jogging. And mark your times in your workout log book.

Stretch well after completion

Special Operations Forces Selection PT Preparation Week 15, Day 7

Saturday morning is a perfect time to go to the gym for a shoulder and back workout. Pull-ups, Lat Pull downs, dumbbell presses, raises etc. Followed by a five-mile run. Log your numbers down in the workout notebook

Training:

More Preparation for the UBRR:

3 x 10 Lat Pulldowns, rear

3 x 10 Barbell Dead Lift

3 x 10 Wide Grip Pull-ups

3 x 10 Seated Rows

3 x 10 Dumbbell Side Raises

3 x 10 Seated Bent-Over Delt Raise

3 x 10 Dumbbell Shoulder Press

3 x 10 Arnold Dumbbell Press

5-mile run

Stretch well after completion

President Maduro Warns Military of Impending ‘US Invasion’

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has warned the military to be on alert after reports on Wednesday had the United States planning to invade the country. President Trump supposedly was calling for the invasion with his staff.

“You cannot lower your guard for even a second, because we will defend the greatest right our homeland has had in all of its history, which is to live in peace,” Maduro said. “A military intervention on the part of the US empire will never be a solution to Venezuela’s problems.”
Maduro alluded to a report by The Associated Press that Trump had asked his aides why the US couldn’t simply invade Venezuela. According to the report, former State Secretary Rex Tillerson and ex-national security adviser H.R. McMaster took turns explaining the possible fallout.
Both officials are no longer at the White House.
The report also detailed a meeting between Trump and four Latin American leaders in which the US president raised the idea, only for it to be rejected by his counterparts. The White House has refused to confirm the report’s validity, saying it will not comment on personal conversations.
Last year, Trump told reporters that he was “not going to rule out” a military option, saying it was “certainly something that we could pursue.”
Trump has described Maduro as a “dictator,” saying he should no longer be in power. Under Maduro, Venezuela has witnessed a significant deterioration of human rights and the erosion of democratic institutions.
More than 130 people were killed and hundreds more injured in 2017, when a Supreme Court order to strip the opposition-held National Assembly triggered months of anti-government protests. Venezuela has continued to struggle with exorbitant inflation and chronic shortages of basic supplies, including food and medicine.

With their people starving and a total meltdown of the economy, nearly a million Venezuelans have been flocking across the border into Colombia. The currency of the country is next to worthless.

In many places, the barter system is making a comeback. In one place a haircut cost five bananas and two eggs or a sack of corn flour. Water is being rationed although it is plentiful, the infrastructure has shut down.

Inflation is running at impossible levels for the government to keep up with. Medicine, food, and water are all in short supply.

To read the entire article from Deutsche Welle, click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Russian Veterans Urge Putin to Tell the Truth About Syrian Mission

In an intriguing turn of events, Russian veterans want the Russian government to acknowledge that private military contractors are fighting in the war in Syria, doing the country’s bidding to keep Russian “troop” strength low. They want to secure financial and medical benefits for the contractors as well as their families.

The statement breaks years of public silence about a secret operation involving thousands of Russian civilians fighting in Syria on the side of President Bashar al-Assad whom Moscow has been helping militarily since September 2015.
Based on accounts of people who knew killed fighters and a military medic, Reuters earlier reported that over a hundred contractors had died in combat since the start of the operation in Syria. The Kremlin denies such an operation exists.
“For three years already, we have been receiving complaints and appeals from Russian citizens who were injured in Syria and cannot undergo medical treatment in Russia,” said the statement, signed by retired Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov, retired Colonel Vladimir Petrov and Yevgeni Shabayev, a Cossack leader.
“Soldiers and officers of these combat units have no social, medical or financial support from the state … We demand that the status of combat participants in private military companies be recognised,” the statement said.
The Kremlin is often criticized by the liberal opposition for its foreign military campaigns but rarely faces objections from Russia’s military elite, which is generally happy that Moscow is in a standoff with the West.
Moscow says that while some Russian civilians may fight in Syria, they went there on their own initiative and have no connection to the military, which is conducting air strikes with a limited presence on the ground.
According to Russian law, being a mercenary is a crime.

The Russian contractors are hired by a company called Wagner and is owned by Dmitriy Valeryevich Utkin, a former Ukranian citizen who was a Colonel and brigade commander of a special forces Spetsnaz unit of Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU).

Wagner has training facilities for their contractors on Russian military bases at Molkino near the village of Molkin. Wagner, (named after Utkin’s callsign) also has been linked to Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, who is also a close friend of Russian President Putin.

Putin was photographed with Utkin and several of his lieutenants which set off speculation in the past. The contractors have been active in Ukraine, Central African Republic, Sudan, Yemen, and Libya.

To read the entire article from US News and World Report, click here: